


Of Magic and Eating

by redboy



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Alternate Universe - Magical Realism, I want to clarify that there is the bare minimum amount of "magic" (not magic) in this, Incubus Oikawa Tooru, M/M, Oikawa is an incubus and a nerd thats basically it, Pining, but poorly described, is it magical realism i don't know, iwaizumi hajime blushing: the fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-25
Updated: 2019-03-25
Packaged: 2019-12-07 06:20:45
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,783
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18231089
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/redboy/pseuds/redboy
Summary: As big of a deal the whole ‘Oikawa is an incubus’ thing seems in theory, they don’t really talk about it (save for Hajime’s occasional teasing). It’s just another part of their lives, just another thing Oikawa does everyday, like--well--like eating. They go to school and they play volleyball, they eat, Oikawa acts like a brat, Hajime scowls, and Oikawa flirts with girls for sustenance. There’s not much more to mention than that.Or that’s what Hajime would have said if somebody had asked him before the moment Oikawa pauses their dozenth rewatch of Pacific Rim to ask him, “Can I kiss you?”-Or, Oikawa is an incubus and Hajime suffers.





	Of Magic and Eating

**Author's Note:**

> Edit: changed the rating from E to M

“I’m an incubus,” Tooru tells him one day.

Tooru is close to his face, whispering, even though they are the only ones in the Iwaizumis’ fenced in backyard. His voice is doing that clenchy, excited thing it does when he discovers a new kind of bug in the park or when his mom says Hajime can sleep over or, recently, when he talks about volleyball. They’re eight and Hajime doesn’t know what ‘incubus’ means, but he understands that it’s a secret and that it’s something cool because Tooru only sounds like that when he talks about cool things. But he doesn’t know what it means so he just says, “Okay.”

Tooru pouts, obviously underwhelmed by Hajime’s bald acceptance of his pronouncement.

“Well, maybe not,” he admits, bending down to rip the tips off a handful grass. “My mom says I won’t know until I’m older. She said someday I’ll feel tired and sick for no reason, and then a girl will hug me and I’ll be happy again!” He looks up at Hajime, brown eyes huge and shining for a moment before he deflates again, returning his doleful gaze to the ground. “That’s only if I have the magic in me, though. Mom has it, but Nee-san doesn’t so I probably won’t either.”

Hajime looks down at his friend distractedly picking through the grass at his feet. There’s a petulant, sour twist to his mouth that Tooru will one day decide is unattractive and replace with plastic smiles or lip-emphasizing pouts. Hajime looks at him and thinks that he’s the only person in the world who could get depressed by something that had excited him only a minute ago. He thinks about how good Tooru is getting at volleyball, about how he’s really good at checkers. He thinks about how hard it is not to laugh when Tooru’s laughing really hard and he knows that the magic is in him. He doesn’t get what girls or hugs have to do with it, but Tooru must be one-- an incubus.

Hajime doesn’t know a lot about it but he knows that magic is rare and it’s special and so is Tooru so it only makes sense that the two are twined together.

He’s not sure how to say any of this, though, or even if he’s supposed to, so instead he says, “It sounds like the girls are the magic ones, not you,” and delights in the shock of indignation on Tooru’s pale face before he pulls his feet out from under him.

-

Oikawa is an incubus.

There is never a moment of realization, of discovery, at least that Hajime’s aware of, but rather it becomes an increasingly present fact of their lives as time passes.

By the time they’re 14, Oikawa is nearly as tall as him and infinitely more charming. The whiny, obsessive nerd of his childhood has long since disappeared into the center of the matryoshka doll that is Oikawa’s personality, and Hajime is forever torn between irritation at the sickly sweetness of his facade and selfish happiness that he’s still the only person who really knows him.

It’s around this time that girls start to accumulate around Oikawa, almost as if they can smell the magic on him. It’s hardly surprising. He’s handsome, Hajime can privately admit, now that he’s mostly grown into his nose. He’s a star in his sport and has that soft, swishy hair that’s so trendy with pop stars these days. Perhaps most appealingly, he accepts the affection of his every admirer with warmth and sugary sweet smiles and none of the entitlement and cruelty so popular with boys their age.

Girls older and younger press in around him, passing him notes in class, letting him brush hair from their faces, linking fingers in the hallway between classes, never realizing that with every touch, every hug, every brush of his skin against theirs they’re feeding him.

That’s how Oikawa had described it the one time, years ago, Hajime asked him what it felt like.

“Eating,” he’d said. “It’s like being hungry, but then I touch somebody or smile at them and they smile back at me and suddenly I feel like I just ate milk bread or your mom’s curry rice or something.”

And Hajime had grinned at him in the dark of Oikawa’s bedroom because the most magical thing about Hajime was his uncle’s faerie second wife, but he had understood perfectly what Oikawa meant. He’d seen him shovel down his mom’s curry rice too many times not to.

The fact that, by his own description, Oikawa sounded like some kind of cannibalistic demon had only compounded the perfection of the metaphor. The hilarity of it only grew each year as he became bolder, as smiles shared with female classmates turned into brushes turned into embraces, and Hajime learned to easily distinguish a casual touch from a hungry, calculated one. He’d wasted no time in nicknaming Oikawa ‘Cannibalkawa’ and absolutely revelled in Oikawa’s horror everytime he heard it.

As big of a deal the whole ‘Oikawa is an incubus’ thing seems in theory, they don’t really talk about it (save for Hajime’s occasional teasing). It’s just another part of their lives, just another thing Oikawa does everyday, like--well--like eating. They go to school and they play volleyball, they eat, Oikawa acts like a brat, Hajime scowls, and Oikawa flirts with girls for sustenance. There’s not much more to mention than that.

Or that’s what Hajime would have said if somebody had asked him before the moment Oikawa pauses their dozenth rewatch of Pacific Rim to ask him, “Can I kiss you?”

Hajime stares at him. It’s the summer before their first year of high school and Hajime is newly 15. They’re at opposite ends of the Oikawas’ squishy tan couch, legs tangled under a blanket of empty candy wrappers, and Oikawa’s face is lit up green-blue by the TV. He knows he’s serious because he paused the movie during the part where the Kaiju attack Japan. It’s his favorite scene. One time Hajime talked through it and Oikawa had been so irritated he’d restarted the whole movie in a fit of petty rage.

Hajime stares at him because he knows he’s serious, he just can’t figure out why.

“Uh,” Hajime says finally, because Oikawa isn’t saying anything more, just fidgeting and silently watching Hajime’s face. “Why?”

Oikawa bites down on the corner of his bottom lip and frowns. “Just- just answer. It’s not anything--weird,” he promises. When no answer is forthcoming, his frown deepens subtly, forehead creasing, and he adds, “You can say no, it’s okay.”

“I--” Hajime says. Then, “Fine,” because he doesn’t get it, but it’s Oikawa and although he could write books on the things he doesn’t understand about him, he does know this: it takes a lot for Oikawa to ask for something--not to whine and wheedle and cover the request in layers of falsities and charm, but to ask for something plainly enough to be in danger of rejection.

Hajime doesn’t get it, but he’s never been good at denying Oikawa anything, no matter how weird or stupid, so he takes a breath and says, “Fine.”

There’s blank shock on Oikawa’s face for only a fraction of a second before he’s scrambling across the couch, wrappers crinkling under his knees. Hajime curses and boxes him in the gut in retaliation for the knee Oikawa smashes into his hip bone, but if it hurts at all Oikawa doesn’t let on.

Hajime is about to exclaim what a faker Oikawa is, always whining about how bad Hajime’s punches hurt, what a bully he is, how vicious, when there’s lips against his.

Hajime’s mouth goes slack with surprise, palms instinctively rising to press Oikawa’s chest back. He freezes then, tenses stiff as timber to stop himself from pushing Oikawa away like his body intuitively wants to.

A hand--large, too large for its owner’s body--settles on his neck. Oikawa’s thumb strokes slowly, carefully against the skin behind Hajime’s ear and Hajime becomes abruptly aware that somewhere in the time between Oikawa leaning in and this moment he’d closed his eyes, but can’t pinpoint when it was.

Oikawa pulls back a hairsbreadth, hand still moving deliberately on his neck. Their lips come apart.

“Relax, Iwa-chan,” he whispers, not even a centimeter from Hajime’s face. His breath is hot on Hajime’s lips and there’s something about the feeling, about how Hajime can suddenly tell that Oikawa had been lying earlier when he’d fervently denied eating any of Hajime’s sour gummy worms that makes him shiver.

Oikawa kisses him again and this time Hajime notices how soft it is. He only has one point of comparison (last day of middle school, when Kimiko from Dance Club had asked to speak to him privately then promptly planted one on him with such roughness it’d split his lip) so Hajime isn’t sure if it’s because Oikawa has soft lips or because he’s kissing him so gently, but…

Well--it’s nice.

It’s only been a couple seconds, but it occurs to Hajime then that maybe he should kiss back. The moment he thinks it, though, Oikawa is pulling back to sit on his folded legs and--oh.

Instantly everything makes sense. Oikawa is smiling at him, small and sweet, and it’s only now, seeing his face so relaxed and happy, that Hajime realizes how tight the lines around his mouth have been recently, how drawn his face has looked despite sleeping until noon most days.

Hajime punches him.

“Ow! What the hell, Iwa-chan?” he squeals, clutching his arm. “You said I could!”

“You’re so stupid.” He cuffs Oikawa on the ear. “Why didn’t you tell me you were hungry?”

Oikawa colors. “I’m not a cannibal! Don’t call me that!”

“Did I call you a cannibal, Shittykawa?” Hajime says, annoyed. “Shut up,” he adds when Oikawa looks ready to argue, eyebrows all scrunchie. He scrubs his hands over his face. “What happened to hugs?”

Oikawa squints at him, and Hajime thinks, with no small amount of irritation, that he looks pretty--annoyingly, unfairly pretty-- in the muted light of the TV. “Hugs?” he repeats.

“Yeah. Hugs,” Hajime grunts. “I thought that was what you…needed, or whatever.”

He doesn’t know why he’s asking. He doesn’t know much about what it means to be an incubus, what it entails. Even Oikawa, who actually is one, doesn’t seem to have concrete explanations any time they discuss it. Every sentence begins with a qualifier (“It’s like…”, “I read…”, “I think…”). But he guesses that somewhere in the back of his mind he’d suspected for awhile now that this whole incubus thing would end up here eventually. He’s not surprised in the least so he’s not sure why he’s even asking about it.

Comprehension registers on Oikawa’s face. He says a bright, “Oh!” and laughs.

The laugh lights up his whole face, cheeks still slightly pink. Hajime’s stomach turns as he’s hit for the second time by how marked the difference is from before the kiss. He feels like shit, like a bad friend because he hadn’t noticed, hadn’t thought anything of Oikawa’s appearance or behavior, other than a passing wondering if he had been staying up late again recently.

“Oh, Iwa-chan,” he says, voice smooth and lilting. “I’m almost a man. My tastes are maturing. Pretty soon only the soft touch of a woman between the sheets will satisfy me.” He wiggles his perfect brown eyebrows and smirks.

His tone is stretched, joking, but Hajime knows somehow that that is for his benefit--that what Oikawa is telling him right now is a fact, no matter how he angles his eyebrows.

When Hajime doesn’t reply, Oikawa rolls onto his butt and stretches his legs out over Hajime’s. True to character, Oikawa takes his silence to mean that he should continue talking. “It’s like--well, I read most of this on Reddit so I dunno, but so far it seems true.” He pauses. “You make fun of me, but it really is like food. When we were little, I could get a six piece chicken nugget from McDonald’s and that would be good enough-”

“No,” Hajime interrupts, already annoyed. “Whenever you got a six piece, you always cried because you would eat it in thirty seconds and then you were still hungry so I’d have to give you one of my cheeseburgers.”

“I have no memory of that,” Oikawa answers promptly, threateningly digging the blunt edge of a bitten-down nail into the skin of Hajime’s neck. Hajime smacks his hand away. “ _Anyways_. When I was seven, six chicken nuggets were enough, but by the time I was ten my body was bigger and becoming excellent at volleyball. Ten year old me couldn’t survive on just six chicken nuggets anymore. Ten year old me needed nuggets and fries. Now I’m fourteen and while nuggets-”

“Yeah, yeah, nuggets and fries, I get it,” Hajime rolls his eyes. But he does. Get it. Oikawa’s incubus needs are growing with him. And he’s not just ‘hungrier,’ his tastes are changing. Nuggets and fries are all well and good for a child, but Oikawa won’t be a child forever. Someday he’s going to need a bigger meal, a meal with more sustenance.

Hajime doesn’t know why the thought scares him, but it does, so much. He’s caught for a long moment in a riptide of dread, but then it fades, troughs, and Hajime quickly reaches for the remote to unpause the movie before this second of reprieve ends and it can rise back up to choke him. Or worse: before his mind’s already cracking shield of self-preservation completely crumbles and he is forced to understand the awful truth behind his fear.

It’s only later, when they’re tucked into bed (Hajime on the futon, Oikawa on the bed) in the dark of Oikawa’s too cold room that Hajime remembers Oikawa never answered his question.

“How come you didn’t tell me?” He mumbles into the darkness between their beds. “That you weren’t feeling good,” he adds hastily, easily predicting the tired pattern of arguing they often fall into when Hajime forgets to clarify what he means.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about. I’m perfectly well, Iwa-chan,” Oikawa sing-songs.

The evasion is aggravating enough that he’d hit him if he could reach, but he’s so tired and warm under the half dozen blankets Oikawa piled onto him that it hardly seems worth the trouble. He settles for the next best option: he ignores him, letting his eyes pull shut as he waits.

Sure enough, only a handful of seconds later Oikawa’s put upon sigh breaks the silence of the room.

“It wasn’t bad, I was fine. It’s just a shock, you know? Even a normal person would feel sick transitioning from the daily adoration of his many loving fans to only Iwa-chan’s brutish company!” Hajime can hear the laugh in his voice.

“Whatever. You’re a piece of shit,” he says, rolling onto his side. He’s so tired, can tell his words are starting to melt together. “Just tell me next time, okay? I don’t care. If you need to kiss me, it’s fine.”

There’s a loud rustling above him, sudden enough to make Hajime open his eyes. Oikawa is laying on his stomach with his head over the edge of the bed, peering down at Hajime. It’s too dark to see his expression, but there’s a slight glint to his eyes and Hajime thinks that his mouth may be open. Maybe it’s Oikawa’s silence or the way he’s looking down on him or the combination of the two, but Hajime feels a swell of relief that he can’t read the look on Oikawa’s face right now.

Finally Oikawa says, “I didn’t tell you because I didn’t want you to feel like you had to kiss me because I’m an incubus and I was hungry.”

His tone is serious enough that, to Hajime’s displeasure, it dispels some of the sleep fog swirling through his head. He closes his eyes again, hoping Oikawa gets the clue and wraps the conversation up soon. “I let you kiss me because you’re Oikawa and you asked. How is that any different?”

“Let me,” Oikawa repeats blankly. There’s a long silence. “I guess it’s not.”

“Don’t be mad,” Hajime nearly whines, because he can hear the bitterness suddenly teeming in Oikawa’s voice. It’s too late to deal with this. It’s hard enough trying to pick apart the hairpin turns Oikawa’s moods take when Hajime’s fully awake and watching the play of emotion on his features. He doesn’t stand a chance now, in the blackness of Oikawa’s bedroom, fighting the gentle pull of sleep on his mind. “I know it’s hard for you to ask for help, but it’s not a big deal. I wouldn’t say it was if it wasn’t. Can we argue about this in the morning? I’m tired.”

Oikawa turns back onto his back so that Hajime couldn’t see him even if his eyes were open.

“Sure,” he says. “Okay.”

They don’t talk about it.

The next morning is so normal that Hajime nearly forgets they kissed entirely. It isn’t until he’s watching a dribble of pancake syrup run from Oikawa’s mouth that his brain helpfully notifies him that those lips were pressed to his not even half a day ago. He flushes hot with he doesn’t know what and ends up knocking his juice off the table in his haste to do anything with his hands that might distract him.

Oikawa never asks to kiss him again. Despite the sincerity of his offer, Hajime can’t help feeling grateful.

They don’t talk about the kiss, or Hajime’s offer, or anything to do with incubi for a over a year. It’s not until Oikawa tells Hanamaki and Matsukawa, tall and gloating, over a conciliatory back-to-school dinner, that _yes, unbelievably, he could get_ more _alluring_ , that Oikawa mentions his nature again at all.

Predictably, both Hanamaki and Matsukawa struggle between fascination with the subject and the deliciousness of denying Oikawa attention and praise he thinks he’s owed. Neither of them have ever met an incubus, after all, so if every once in awhile they break down and indulge Oikawa with their interest, Hajime forgives them. He just wishes if they were so curious about it, they’d ask the internet and not Oikawa. The internet, at least, doesn’t absolutely relish every morsel of notice it receives. It probably has more accurate information too.

It’s during one such discussion of Oikawa’s incubus abilities that Hajime learns something new and categorically horrifying.

It’s Makki, as it usually is, that caves to the question weighing on his mind. The four of them are in their usual lunch spot, squished in around Hajime’s desk next to the window in Class 5. They would all prefer to take their break on the roof, but a year of constant interruption from conversation by someone or another wanting Oikawa’s attention had become tiresome. Second year found them hiding away in the deserted classroom on the days Oikawa deigns to join them for lunch, appreciating what sparse breeze they could get through the open windows.

“What does it feel like when you come?” Hanamaki asks him with horrifically sincere curiosity, mouth full and muffled. “Is it like extra long or something?”

Oikawa seems to swallow wrong and he coughs harshly, hand to his sternum. He has to gulp down several mouthfuls from his water bottle, watery eyes slitted and glaring and rich, rich brown, before he can manage, “You are so _crude_ , Hanamaki Takahiro. It’s no wonder no girls like you.” It’s so breathless and whiny that Hajime has to hide a smile in his rice.

Makki brushes off the insult, too pleased to have rumpled Oikawa’s cool facade to be offended. “Well? I don’t get it.” He pops another sushi roll into his mouth even though Hajime can see that he still hasn’t swallowed most of the first one. “You get off from sex, obviously. You come from it, I mean. But the incubus part of you gets off from coming so is it like double coming, or…?”

Hajime laughs because leave it to Makki to come up with some inane idea like _double coming_. He looks to Oikawa, ready to share in his amusement, but Oikawa’s not looking back at him. Instead he has his head tipped slightly, mouth stretched in a wry, almost perplexed smile. He does seem amused, but almost like he’s not sure what he’s meant to be laughing at. He’s staring at Hanamaki.

“Well, I don’t ‘get off’ from coming--” he starts.

“It’s like _eating_ , Makki,” Matsukawa deadpans. “Not coming, you pig.”

“It _is_ ,” Oikawa says. Hajime’s eyes cut to him sharply because he expected Oikawa to sound petulant or teasing or smug or any one of his other normal emotions, but he doesn’t. He just sounds confused.

“What?” Hajime says impatiently.

“Uh…” Oikawa hesitates. A small laugh bubbles through his teeth. “You guys know that incubi feed on _other_ people’s lust, right?”

Mattsun and Hanamaki both glance at Hajime, but Hajime doesn’t know either. Oikawa unequivocally has the upper hand.

He knows it too, shit-eating grin dawning big and bright on his stupidly good looking face. He pulls himself up to his fullest height, nearly towering next to their slumped forms, and takes on one of Hajime’s least favorite of his personalities: snobby Oikawa.

“Hmm,” he tsks, flattening out his napkin from the crumpled ball he’d left it in. “I always forget how little you muggles know about magic.”

“Are you going to talk about Harry Potter again?” Mattsun says before Hajime can tell Oikawa what a snot he is. “Because if you’re going to talk about Harry Potter, I’m leaving.”

Oikawa’s hands still. “Mattsun, you love Harry Potter discourse.”

Matsukawa meets his betrayed stare head on. “I love _interesting_ Harry Potter discourse, not your broke theories on ancient defensive magic--”

“Do you think maybe we could go one lunch period without you two derailing conversation to argue over nerd shit?” Hajime sighs, stabbing at his rice with his chopsticks.

Oikawa turns to look at him and he looks so off balance, so taken aback at the turn the conversation has taken. It’s an expression so genuine and open and wrong-footed, one that Hajime sees so rarely anymore, that fondness blooms warm and true in his chest.

It must read on his face because Oikawa’s morphs into this soft, helpless smile, cheeks going as pink as his lips. He opens his mouth and Hajime has this absurd sense that he’s not going to say anything, just Hajime’s name, his given name, mouth honey-sweet around the syllables.

Hajime quickly barrels over him. “What were you saying before?” he prompts, loathe though he is to remind Oikawa of anything that gives him cause for superiority. “About us being muggles.”

“Oh, right!” Oikawa is back to bright, cheery, and annoying, and Hajime knows that he is the only person in the world who could read him well enough to catch the flash of disappointment in his eyes. “Well, like I said, incubi eat other people’s lust. There’s a reason they call us pleasure demons, yeah?”

He’s leering so Hajime says, “You’re so sleazy,” relieved to have the normalcy of it.

Makki seems to find Oikawa’s statement more compelling than Hajime did, though, because he immediately has questions. “So you have to make the girl come to--what--to be full?” He laughs. “Shit, I’d starve.”

“Not everything is about coming, pervert! Jeez, and you call _me_ sleazy, Iwa-chan!”

“What is it about, then?” Matsukawa asks, his characteristically dull tone and expression making it come across skeptical.

Oikawa must glean something genuine from it that Hajime does not because he beams like Mattsun has done him a service. “Thank you for asking, Mattsun-kun! It depends, of course.”

When he doesn’t continue, Hajime glowers, nearing the end of his rope. “Do you need a personal invitation from each of us to tell us? Spit it out or shut up.”

Oikawa pouts, arms crossed and shoulders up near his ears, muttering something that sounds like _“Mean!”_ under his breath. It’s only a moment, though, then he’s grudgingly explaining himself.

“Incubi feed on lust, but it’s not just that. It’s--” He breaks off, considering. “When I kiss a girl now and she get all-- Well, you know,” he says modestly, touching the back of his neck, and it’s somehow more smug, more filthy than if he’d just said it. Turned on. Wet. Whatever. “That’s good for the incubus part of me. But it wasn’t always like this. It built up gradually. When I was little I could just hold someone’s hand and if they liked it, then it made me feel good. Then it was hugging, then kissing, and now…” Oikawa laughs, confident in a way no high school boy has the right to be. “The other stuff is still good, it’s still food, even if it’s platonic. Lust just tastes better.”

“How are you ever hungry at all, sitting next Makki all the time? He’s the horniest person in Japan, maybe in the whole world.”

“He’s practically rabid,” Hajime agrees.

Hanamaki wisely does not attempt to argue, instead opting to prop his head in his hand and grin a seedy grin at Oikawa. “Do I feed you, Oikawa-kun? Are you feasting on my lust?”

“I can’t if I didn’t cause it, Makki. It has to be because of me,” Oikawa informs him, looking slightly disgusted. “Trust me, I can sense it, though.”

And Hajime doesn’t know why it’s taken this long, until this moment for it to dawn on him, but suddenly, suddenly it does. Suddenly, Hajime can hear _“You guys know that incubi feed on other people’s lust, right?”_ and _“If they liked it, then it made me feel good”_ and _“It has to be because of me”_ on repeat, over and over and over again in his head. Suddenly, he can see the relaxed look on Oikawa’s face after he’d finished kissing him and it clicks, heavy as cement on his gut, that it hadn’t been because the incubus part of him was craving a kiss. No, it was because Oikawa kissed him and Hajime had _liked it._

Hajime feels a swell of something that tastes awfully like panic, feels caught even though he hasn’t done anything, doesn’t know what it is he feels so guilty about.

It’s like nausea, though. Like vomit at the back of his throat, the knowledge of what this means ( _Hajime had liked it_ ). His mouth is watering and he can taste the acid of it on his tongue, but he keeps swallowing and swallowing, barely keeping it at bay.

_Hajime had liked it._

He keeps it down through the rest of lunch, through his last three classes, through volleyball practice, and the walk home under Oikawa’s troubled gaze, through dinner and homework and two hours of ESPN.

It’s not until late, until he’s getting ready for bed that the sensation actually goes away. He’s brushing his teeth in the hall bathroom, listening to his parents bicker over what to watch on Netflix, when he meets his reflection’s gaze in the mirror and thinks _I like him_.

He spits toothpaste out of his mouth and goes to bed, goes to school, to volleyball, to the Oikawa’s, and nothing changes, except now he knows. Now he knows why he feels nervous on days Oikawa looks particularly tired or tense. Now he knows why he can’t look at Oikawa’s lips. Now he knows why he’s so afraid that one day Oikawa’s going to put his hand on his neck and say “Can I kiss you?” again. Because Hajime had meant it when he told Oikawa to kiss him if he needed to, that it’s not a big deal. He’d meant that. It isn’t. Except--

Except Hajime likes him. So it is.

-

Hajime’s first party is an awkward affair.

Kozume Mitsuki's parents are out of town and her older sister is taking full advantage, packing their stout, well-kept house with dozens of college friends. There’s a handful of third years mingling as well, mostly girls from Class 4 like Mitsuki, but Hajime has only seen one person, other than Oikawa, Makki, and Mattsun, that he actually knows.

He spends the better part of two hours camped against the drywall next to the living room couch, holding a full Asahi Super Dry, and trying to keep up with the increasingly drunken ramblings of strangers who decide he’s worth a chat.

He doesn’t mind, really. He hadn’t come to get drunk, or (try) to get laid like Makki, or for whatever reason Oikawa does what he does. His ideal Friday night would have had his back against the headboard of Oikawa’s bed, shoulder to Oikawa’s, with a popcorn bowl between them and a movie on his laptop. But this is fine, too. It’s not the most comfortable--it’s hot and smells like weed and sweaty bodies, and there’s a constant trade-off of the awkwardness of small talk with strangers and the awkwardness of standing alone at a party--but it’s better than watching Netflix alone in bed, worrying about his friends getting too shit-faced to get home safe. At least here, he can mom-friend from up close.

Mattsun is in the same place he’s been all night, on the floor against the coffee table ten feet in front of Hajime, laughing with who Hajime’s fairly certain is Kozume-san. Through the sliding glass door, he can see Makki and another third year crushing team after team in beer pong in the backyard. Hajime snorts. Leave it to Makki to squander likely his only opportunity to lose his virginity before high school ends competing in a pointless competition for nothing.

Oikawa disappeared sometime around fifteen minutes ago. Hajime missed the moment, too busy trying to help a tall blonde girl get her hopelessly inebriated boyfriend off the floor. He’s not worried because he’s been keeping track of the wine coolers in Oikawa’s hand (three since arriving) and there’s no way Oikawa’s wasted enough to be puking or passed out. Not with how big he is.

He tries not to think about it, what Oikawa must be off doing in the depths of the house, or who. It’s okay, it’s fine. Oikawa has needs. Not like whiny teenage boy ‘needs’, but _actual, get this or die_ needs.

It’s cool. Hajime just doesn’t want to know.

He goes to the kitchen because there’s only so long he can stare at the back of Matsukawa’s head and not think about Oikawa having sex a few rooms away.

There are two girls leaning against the island, gossiping happily into their hands. They glance over when he comes in, smile at him, giggle. His ears redden. He’s taken aback. He’s seen girls have this exact reaction to Oikawa’s presence a hundred times, a thousand, but it’s the first time it’s happened to him and it’s the first time he wonders why they laugh. He quickly averts his eyes, crosses the kitchen to pour out his beer in the sink.

A stapled packet of papers magneted to the exposed side of the fridge catches his gaze as he’s sticking the bottle in the recycle bin. There’s a navy blue ‘ _94% :)_ ’ at the top of the page, next to Kozume Mitsuki’s neatly printed name. He’s in a different class than her, but he recognizes it immediately as the English test Hajime took on Wednesday. His teacher hasn’t handed theirs back yet, so Hajime curiously flips through Kozume’s, trying to recall what he’d written on his. His mood sours considerably when he gets to the direct object/indirect object section and he realizes that his answers and Kozume’s perfect ones are not at all the same.

He’s bending further to take a closer look at her answers, trying to figure out how he screwed up so bad when he feels a hand, light on the small of his back. Hajime whips around, startled, expecting one of the giggling girls, bold and cute and a few years older, but it’s not. It’s just Oikawa in an empty kitchen. Oikawa who…

Hajime catches the look on his face and tenses. He’s smiling, wide and white, but it’s too sharp, almost mean, mocking, and his eyes are wild as Hajime’s ever seen them. Wild as his voice on the other end of the phone at three o’clock in the morning, night after night, after he blew out his knee. Wild as the panic in his voice when Hajime pitched forward over the handlebars of his bike and fractured his collarbone ten years ago.

“Everyone here is drunk or stoned or trying to get laid and my Iwa-chan is in the kitchen studying,” he says. It should be teasing. It should be playful in Oikawa’s melodic inflection, but it comes out cutting and mean instead. Hajime recognizes this easily for what it is: Oikawa is trying to pick a fight.

He’s careful to keep his voice even to mask the worry that’s now tossing his dinner around his stomach when he asks, “What’s wrong?”

Oikawa drops all pretense of amiability, eyes slitting, mouth in a sneer. It’s Hajime’s least favorite expression on him. It’s his Kageyama Tobio face, the face he makes when he feels hopelessly, helplessly inadequate. It makes Hajime’s heart sink, but he meets Oikawa’s glare levelly, waiting.

Something in Oikawa’s eyes hardens at that, a decision being made. Hajime is ready, for cruelty, for self-deprecation, for determined avoidance, but Oikawa doesn’t say anything, just sets his jaw and very deliberately brushes the backs of two fingers along the highpoint of Hajime’s cheek, painfully gentle.

Hajime rears back slightly in his surprise, breath stuttering in his throat. He watches Oikawa watch tomato red stain his cheeks where his fingers just touched, feeling trapped and stupid.

Oikawa’s face twists into something less defensive and more desperate, and he knows, before Oikawa even opens his mouth, Hajime knows where this is going.

“Hajime, can I--?” He sounds wrecked. “It’s-- Everyone here is so desperate and horny. It’s all I can think about. It’s like I can smell it, but it’s not doing anything, it’s not feeding me. It’s just driving me fucking crazy. I can’t-- Hajime?”

Hajime’s heart is in his throat, anxiety prickling the back of his neck, but he chokes it down enough to scowl at Oikawa. “Yeah, it’s fine, stupid. Didn’t I tell you--”

He shuts up abruptly at the touch of Oikawa’s hands to his jaw, at Oikawa crowding him back against the fridge, tilting his face up.

“Think of someone pretty,” he breathes.

Hajime wants to smack him, to call him an asshole. Wants to tell him that it’s impossible to think of anyone else with his distinct coconut shampoo and teakwood cologne combination in his nose. Wants to tell him that he is pretty, what does he mean _“Think of someone pretty”_? _I am, I am._

But then Oikawa’s kissing him, holding his head in place, while he presses Hajime back against the cold, white plastic of the fridge with his hips. Hajme stumbles back, stepping on the edge of a pet’s full water dish. It tips over onto his sneaker, soaking it, but he can barely notice, let alone care because Oikawa is kissing him, and Hajime is drowning.

Even with considerably more experience than the first time Oikawa leaned in like this, even with months of making out with Saeki Fumiko any place they could find--the back of an empty movie theater, the swings at the park--even with her fire and her reckless, adventurous technique, Hajime is utterly unprepared for the onslaught that is Oikawa.

He’s in every inch of Hajime’s personal space, mouth hot and insistent. He keeps twisting, adjusting the angle, the pressure: rough, then soft, then smug and filthy, and Hajime can’t keep up, can’t breathe, can’t think, can’t, can’t, _can’t_.

He fists his hands in the front of Oikawa’s gray sweater, needing to anchor himself. It’s a mistake. The firm muscle, warm against his knuckles through thin material, only makes something in Hajime’s gut pull tight, tighter, and Oikawa reacts like he can feel it, which, yeah, of course he can. That’s the whole point.

He runs his tongue over Hajime’s bottom lip, just below the seam, almost frenzied. Hajime’s flush burns brighter, embarrassment transforming into supernova heat. His grip clenches tighter in Oikawa’s shirt and he pulls until Oikawa has to step forward to keep from overbalancing, closer into Hajime’s body. Oikawa moans, low and strained, and Hajime doesn’t know what he did, if he did anything, but he’ll give Oikawa anything he wants to hear it again.

It’s too late, though. His one moment of control is gone in an instant, lost to the fevered slide of Oikawa’s hands down to his sides and Oikawa’s tongue in his mouth. Oikawa is licking the back of his teeth, the roof of his mouth, precise and devastating as his serves. His tongue is lime and tequila bitter, curling around Hajime’s, and Hajime’s throat pinches closed around the terrible, sucker-punched out noises rising in his chest.

There’s no respite from Oikawa’s mouth for ages, for seconds. Hajime doesn’t know, but it’s simultaneously endless and will never be enough.

When Oikawa pulls away, Hajime is doused in the most unbelievable blend of disappointment and relief. He doesn’t go far, though, only enough for Hajime to catch the darkness of his eyes, framed in inky black eyelashes. He looks just as crazy as he did five minutes ago, but...different in a way Hajime’s not sure how to quantify. Oikawa’s eyes skip all over Hajime’s face like he’s searching for something and Hajime wants to say _What? Tell me. Whatever you’re looking for, tell me and I’ll give it to you_ , but he doesn’t get the chance (and thank God for that).

Oikawa tilts forward again and grazes his lips against Hajime’s, so faint it’s not even a kiss, just a small, side-to-side caress. It’s too much. Hajime can’t help himself. He’s gasping, canting forward, chasing Oikawa’s mouth before he can think better of it.

His brain catches up to his body a second later, shame blazing through him. He expects Oikawa to zero in on such a mortifying loss of control, smirking and self-satisfied. He doesn’t, though. He knocks their foreheads together and whines, high in the back of his throat.

Then he’s biting. Hajime’s bottom lip. His jaw. His neck. He bites and sucks and licks down to Hajime’s collarbones, back up, until he’s latching onto the sensitive skin beneath Hajime’s ear, at the hinge of his jaw. It’s exactly where his thumb had stroked the first time they did this, Hajime notes deliriously, wishing he didn’t remember.

Oikawa’s hands disappear from his waist, then reappear, almost instantaneously, under his hoodie. They’re shockingly warm on his bare skin, shockingly large and electric on his stomach.

All at once, it’s too much. If Oikawa doesn’t stop right now, Hajime is going to do something horrible, like moan or beg or grind his hardening cock into Oikawa’s thigh. He quickly yanks Oikawa’s arms out of his shirt.

“Stop,” he pants. “Oikawa, stop.” He’s shuddering from head to toe.

Oikawa does immediately, stepping backward, hands dropping limply to his sides. He’s calm now, Hajime sees, but he’s looking back at Hajime with the most guarded expression Hajime’s ever seen him wear, waiting.

It’s whiplash, that’s what the obstinate set to Oikawa’s swollen lips is: whiplash. It pisses Hajime off because seriously? What does Oikawa have to be defensive of? He’s not the one who’s pathetically into his best friend, whose best friend can _feel_ how into him he is and is manipulating it for his own benefit. No, that’s Hajime.

The unfairness of Oikawa using Hajime like he just did then regarding him with the same cold, wary appraisal he reserves for people on the other side of a volleyball net grates on him something fierce. He wants to snap at Oikawa, but over fifteen years of friendship tell him, with unshakeable, crystalline certainty, that if he baits Oikawa into an argument right now he will regret it. Oikawa will say things so intentionally cruel that they’ll make him cry to repeat when he apologizes and that Hajime will think about every time he can’t sleep for the next five years.

So Hajime glares at him as venomously as he can, mouth snarled, but shut.

He peels himself off the fridge side and tries to pretend Oikawa’s silent observation doesn’t bother him as he soaks up the water he spilled with paper towels and refills the cat’s water bowl at the sink. He swallows down a rush of chagrin when he notices the half wet school projects and takeout menus on the linoleum, where Hajime must have knocked them with his back, while he and Oikawa made out.

“We’re getting Mattsun and Makki, then we’re going home,” he tells Oikawa, when the kitchen is as righted as he can make it.

“Okay, Iwa-chan,” Oikawa says, smiling an unreadable smile, and follows Hajime out.

-

Oikawa doesn’t text him all of Sunday, doesn’t show up uninvited to his house, or harass him into helping with the English homework due Monday. It’s highly unusual to not hear from him for more than a handful of hours in some form or another, so Hajime doesn’t know what he’s expecting when he shows up at Oikawa’s front gate early Monday morning, but he’s certainly not expecting...nothing.

He’s not expecting signature Oikawa pep and charm, meandering stories, and “Iwa-chan~” this, that, and the other, and none of the quiet stiffness from Saturday night.

Oikawa is so decidedly normal that Hajime starts to question his read on the situation. It was pretty dark in the kitchen. He could have misinterpreted Oikawa’s demeanor. It wasn’t something that happened often, but it wouldn’t be the first time, either. Maybe he was just tired. Or on the wrong side of tipsy. Or ashamed to have needed Hajime’s help.

Whatever. Hajime has been doing an extraordinary job of not freaking out--or even _thinking_ \-- about the kiss, if he does say so himself. If Oikawa’s temperamental ass is already over whatever was bothering him, then so much better for Hajime. He certainly hadn’t been looking forward to verbally rehashing what happened in order to figure out what Oikawa’s deal was. It’s a relief, really.

It takes Hajime almost a week to realize that Oikawa won’t touch him anymore.

It’s not anything. It’s just--Thursday, at lunch, he stretches his legs out straight under his desk and it pings something odd in his brain.

He glances at Oikawa and Oikawa’s not doing anything in particular. He’s poking his chopsticks through Mattsun’s food, telling a story about Takeru that he probably thinks makes the kid seem like a brat, but really makes him look like a tiny badass.

And yeah, it’s nothing, but Hajime can’t remember the last time Oikawa didn’t take full advantage of the obnoxious length of his legs to lock them with Hajime’s while they ate.

Hajime’s ankles feel odd and light without Oikawa’s heavy ones rested on top of them. Even after lunch, when Oikawa goes back to his own class, he can’t stop fidgeting them, restless and annoyed at himself because _holy fuck_ does he need to get a grip.

It’s not weird enough for Hajime to be concerned. It’s out of his mind as soon as the math on the blackboard starts to get complicated and he has to focus both of his brain cells on not getting lost.

He doesn’t think about it again until they’re coming out of the convenience store a couple streets over from their houses. They’re bickering over whether or not some famous actress is pretty. Oikawa doesn’t think so, mercilessly tears into this girl’s appearance as he chews his Snickers bar, and Hajime argues, half because Oikawa’s _wrong_ , she’s stupid hot, idiot, half to hide how pleased he is. He doesn’t give a shit if Oikawa finds her unattractive, but this particular brand of childish meanness is something only Hajime gets to know about. For all his callousness, Oikawa would never dream of talking about a girl with anything short of perfect politeness in front of anyone but Hajime. Not even Hanamaki or Matsukawa.

It happens after Hajime finishes enumerating exactly why Oikawa’s incorrect. Oikawa is starting in on a classic Oikawa Tooru ad hominem argument, smirking, silvery and excited, leaning sideways into Hajime’s personal space.

“Oh, does Iwa-chan have a crush? How cute!” he coos. His fingers come up in the universal _I’m going to pinch you_ formation, which is annoying, but nothing unusual.

Or it isn’t until Oikawa abruptly jerks his hand away, an inch from Hajime’s cheek, as if he’d been shocked by the air between their skin.

He drops his hand and smiles at Hajime, like he thinks if it’s wide and bright enough, Hajime won’t realize how odd that was or how he suddenly doesn’t seem to know what to say.

Hajime stops in the middle of the sidewalk, organs barrel rolling in his abdomen as he tries to remember if Oikawa had rested a palm on his shoulder today while he gave his customary post-practice pep talk, if he leaned their shoulders together while they worked on homework together last night. He’s not sure, he’s not sure, but he definitely remembers the coldness of his legs at lunch without Oikawa’s wedged between them.

 _Oikawa isn’t touching him_. It’s cold and sinking in the pit of his stomach and he can’t help the hurt little “Oh” that bubbles out of him before he can choke it down.

Oikawa is upset. Apparently Hajime had assessed the situation just fine, after all. They’d kissed and now Oikawa is upset enough to not want to touch him anymore. He must have realized, once he drank his fill and calmed down, how weird and creepy it was for Hajime to be lusting after him, for him to be able to soak it up like that.

Hajime tries to correct his face into a scowl because Oikawa has stopped too now and is looking at back at him. The nervous grin melts off Oikawa’s face into something startled and urgent. “Iwa-chan--”

“What’s your problem?” Hajime is shaking. “I didn’t-- It’s not my--”

Oikawa grabs his wrist with a little squeeze that simultaneously makes his heart lurch and soothes his stomach. Oikawa’s grip squeezes tighter in response and Hajime knows he’s caught.

“This,” he says, pained. He picks up Hajime’s other hand, holds them together in his calloused ones. He stares down at their hands between them like the twist of them together hurts him. “I-- sometimes I touch you or say stuff and you just...radiate, and then I’m not sure why I did it. If maybe I was hoping you would, because of what I am. Like maybe I’m subconsciously always trying to make people feed me. Even you.” He smiles, self-deprecating, like he’s not ripping apart Hajime’s world. “Did you know when we were little, sometimes I would-- sometimes I’d just have to smile at you, and that’s all it took? I’d be full for days, for weeks.”

“Sorry,” Hajime says.

Oikawa’s eyes cut to him, then away again, mouth pinched. “You don’t get it. It’s not okay. Just manipulating you into feeling what I want you to feel. It’s not-- And you _let me!_ ”

Hajime can’t keep up. “I’m supposed to let you go hungry?”

“I’m not some starving child in Africa! I don’t need you to feed me. Look at me!” He yanks his hands out of Hajime’s so that he can gesture jerkily down the length of his body. “Half the girls in our year would spread their legs for me if I asked! I don’t need you to--”

Oikawa cuts himself off, but the way his sentence started, like he’s was about to say _Hajime_ would spread his legs if he asked him to, turns Hajime redder than he’s ever been in his life.

“Then ask them to!” he shouts. It’s easier to be angry. “I don’t know why you’re acting like-- _You_ asked _me_ , Oikawa.”

“Aren’t you listening, Iwa-chan? That’s the problem!”

“ _What is?_ ”

Oikawa makes an aborted gesture, like he’s going to reach up and throttle Hajime. He seems to think better of it. His arms relax back to his sides and he takes a deep, calming breath. “It’s not right for me to ask to kiss you when I know you love me and worry too much about me to say no. You’re so bad at saying no to me and normally I like it because it’s just about ten more minutes of practice or who has to get up to turn off the light. But this is different. You have to be able to say no to this.”

 _“When I know you love me.”_ It’s awful to hear out loud, worse than his worst nightmares, but Hajime understands now. Oikawa’s worried Hajime’s _too in love with him_ to prioritize himself. Great.

The mortification of the moment is like the ulcer Hajime worried into his stomach lining in primary school, before he learned how to let things go. More anger rises instinctually to protect him, but then Oikawa smiles at him, so fake and sad, it evaporates the fight out of him before he can even unclench his jaw.

He matches Oikawa’s deep breath with his own, then says, as calmly and as measured as he can, “I did.”

“What?”

“I said no. When it was too much, I told you to stop. Believe it or not, I am capable of telling you no so you can fuck off with this bullshit you’re on, like you’re somehow forcing me, or something.”

Oikawa furrows his brows. “I know, but…”

“But what?” Hajime sighs. “Look, I’m not saying every time you’re hungry you should come to me. Just, if it’s really bothering you and you can’t find anyone, I don’t mind, okay? It’s not going to break my heart.” Probably. “It _will_ piss me off, though, if I have to watch you mope around because you can’t convince anyone to let you stick your slimy tongue down their throat.”

“Iwa-chan! My tongue is not slimy! It is smooth and artful!” He hesitates for half a second before going for it, full tilt. “Come to you when I’m hungry? You should be so lucky!”

Laughter makes Hajime’s rib punch weak. Oikawa leans on him anyway, like now he needs a crutch to continue his walk home. It’s the same as he’s done a hundred times before, but this is the first time it makes happiness seep through Hajime’s veins and tissues instead of exasperation.

He lets it spread, even though Oikawa can surely feel it in whatever part of his body needs lust like his bones need Vitamin D. The apples of Oikawa’s cheeks tinge healthy pink.

“Okay?” Hajime presses.

Oikawa rolls his eyes. “Yes, fine. So pushy,” he tsks. “If you wanted in my pants that badly, you only had to say. You know I’d never deny a fan!”

Hajime sets his bag and his ginger ale down. “You have two seconds--”

Oikawa runs.

-

They end up at different universities.

They argue about it for months leading up to the decision deadline. Their fights become so vicious and circular that even Oikawa’s father, the most patient man Hajime has ever met, leaves the room when they enter rather than listen to their bickering.

It doesn’t help that they’re always together, more than they ever have been before, nearly constantly. Perhaps they both sense the inevitability of their separation, no matter how hard Oikawa campaigns against it.

It’s the right decision. Both Oikawa and Hajime have spots on Division One volleyball teams, if they want them, and Oikawa has a few on _good_ D1 teams, but only one school offered for them both, and not a particularly competitive one at that.

Oikawa rails against it with everything he has, but when it comes time he sits on Hajime’s bedroom floor and calls Tokyo University’s head coach to graciously accept their scholarship.

Hajime rubs Oikawa’s back as he shakes apart and clutches at Hajime’s shirt, then he calls and accepts his own offer at the school he just convinced Oikawa to turn down.

It’s the right decision. Oikawa can whine about betrayal and what could have been all he wants, but it is. Tokyo University is nationally ranked and one day Oikawa is going to be their captain. He’s going to draw V.League scouts to the TU gym like flies to honey. And Hajime--

Well, Hajime’s going to the best sports medicine school in the country, isn’t he?

It’s not like they’ll be across the country from each other, either. Waseda University is so close to the TU campus that one of the university bus lines stops off at the steps of Waseda’s student union. It’s only a 20ish minute ride. Hajime checked. They can make 20 minutes work. It’ll probably be good for them even, not living hip-to-hip (for the first year, at least). Maybe Oikawa will grow up. Maybe Hajime will stop being in love with him.

Ha ha.

It goes better than expected. College is overwhelming and fun and miserable. It passes at breakneck speed and Hajime has never been more in his element.

Half the time, Hajime comes back to his single in Waseda’s freshman dorm after a long day of practice, classes, and study groups to find Oikawa with his nose in a textbook or laser focused on a match playing on his laptop, having let himself in with the key Hajime very hesitantly (not to mention illegally) got copied for him at Lowes.

It’s good, it’s great. It’s the same and completely different. They still watch the same movies, bitch about homework, pass a volleyball back and forth. Oikawa still only lays on the futon Hajime makes up for him for less than a half hour before he worms his way under Hajime’s covers.

Except now Hajime watches Oikawa’s games from the stands and they have separate friend groups. Hajime studies for his career and Oikawa completes his work only as far as it interests him, already a first string setter with higher priorities.

Also, they kiss.

Not a lot. Never as frantically or as long or as handsy as before. Oikawa is always careful on those nights he’s too exhausted or lazy to go out and find someone to satisfy his cravings and needs a tide-over. He rarely so much as toes the line of what he can get away with, rolls out of Hajime’s lap as soon as he gets close with a sheepish, horribly disarming grin.

When Oikawa’s done, Hajime takes in that smile and sex hair and red mouth. He lets it overwhelm him for just a moment, then he tucks it away into the back of his mind and never lets himself think about it again, not even for a second.

-

That night it starts the same as it always does: with a sigh.

Usually it comes from Hajime’s desk chair or the end of his bed. Usually it’s accompanied by an explanation for why Oikawa hasn’t gotten laid lately that he somehow turns into a brag. Then, sure as rain, “Can I kiss you?”, and Oikawa relaxing into his mouth.

But Oikawa is preparing for a match this weekend to determine the prefecture quarterfinals so there’s nothing normal or typical about his behavior. He’s silent and focused most of the night, channeling his stress into obsessive watching and rewatching of opponent matches and shrewd note taking.

Hajime forces him to eat the ramen he nuked in the microwave, presses a cold glass of water into his hands and watches, exasperated, as he chugs it, but he mostly leaves him be. At least he’s here. At least when Hajime informs him he’s going to sleep, Oikawa shimmies down the bed so that he’s lying on his back, even if the scratch of pen on paper barely pauses for a second.

It’s better than nothing. Who knows what time he would crash if he was back in his dorm without Hajime to keep him accountable?

Maybe Hajime is feeling generous because when he gets into bed, he doesn’t turn the light off and shove Oikawa over, as is habit. Instead, he crawls over his legs and curls up on the sliver of mattress between the chilly wall and Oikawa’s body, leaving it to Oikawa to click the bedside lamp off when he’s done scribbling plays in his notebook.

Hajime has never been able to fall asleep with the light on, not even turned on his side, facing the wall, so when, about an hour after he’s clicked his phone off and closed his eyes, Oikawa starts fidgeting, Hajime is still mercilessly conscious. He’s not sure whether the instant stab of anticipation or irritation is worse. He wishes he was asleep.

Oikawa starts kicking his legs like they’re restless and flicking through his notes with heavy sighs that blanket over Hajime, one after the other. Hajime unsuccessfully attempts to steady his heartbeat while he waits for Oikawa to give in to the incubus hunger that’s obviously gnawing at him and ask the inevitable question. But he doesn’t, just continues to huff and shift and huff some more until Hajime is ready to roll over and kill him.

“Are you trying to drive me crazy, Crappykawa?”

Oikawa startles next to him. “Ah, Iwa-chan, I didn’t realize you were still awake.”

“Well, I am,” Hajime says, kindly not pointing out that it’s entirely his fault. “Are you gonna ask or what?”

Oikawa hums. “Ask what?”

“Fine,” Hajime snorts. “Be that way.” He settles deeper under the covers pointedly.

There’s a long silence, then the comforter rustles. Oikawa rolls over and presses his body against Hajime’s, chest to ankle, spooning them together. He slides his hand under Hajime’s t-shirt so that his fingers splay wide across his stomach. It’s Hajime’s turn to startle.

He runs his nose along the side of Hajime’s neck.

“Oikawa?”

Oikawa lets out a long, stuttered breath. Hajime waits, expects him to speak then, to roll him over and ask for his kiss.

He doesn’t. Instead he kisses the curve between Hajime’s neck and shoulder. At first it’s chaste, lips pressed sweetly to skin. Then it’s more. Then it’s open-mouthed. He kisses and sucks lightly until Hajime is almost panting, despite lying totally motionless.

Oikawa sighs again and the coolness of his breath on the wet of Hajime’s neck makes Hajime shudder. Oikawa rests his forehead against the the back of his neck and pulls Hajime back, with the hand on his stomach, tighter against him.

For the briefest instance, Hajime is washed over with the feeling of it, sweatpants against boxers and bare legs, t-shirt against t-shirt, and the hard muscle underneath. It’s so quick that even the shame that normally churns his stomach in these moments doesn’t have time to sour how much he likes it, Oikawa up against him. How much he wants it. More and forever.

The thrill lasts only a second before it’s eclipsed spectacularly when Oikawa starts rubbing.

The touch is barely there, the lightest brush of his fingers, trailing up and down Hajime’s abs. It’s purposeful. If they were dating it would be playful, teasing, meant to seduce.

But they’re not. They’re not, so Hajime clamps down on the way his breath wants to whistle in his throat and the instinct to press back against him. He pushes down how unsure he feels at this sudden change in M.O. without Oikawa’s expression to guide him through it. He shuts up and stays still so Oikawa can get his rocks off in peace.

It’s like Oikawa is intent on not letting him, though. His touch becomes firmer. Every drag of long fingers downward cinches Hajime’s gut tighter. It feels like he’s being wound like a clock or a cheap wind up toy. There’s no relief from it.

Oikawa bumps his nose against Hajime’s ear, drags his lips around the edge.

“Come on, Iwa-chan.” He’s smiling, Hajime can tell, can feel it. “Come on.”

He dips a finger under the waistband of Hajime’s boxers, just one, and all he does is run it slowly over the imprint of bunched elastic on the skin between his hips, but Hajime wasn’t prepared, he wasn’t ready. Heat burns through him, forcing his breath to shudder audibly when he inhales in surprise. The exhale is almost worse, so high and pinched it’s only barely not a whine.

And he’s hard. So achingly hard.

He’s not sure if it’s in reaction to the shake in his breath or the desire ratcheting higher and higher in his belly, but Oikawa abruptly pulls back and yanks Hajime over onto his back, probably harder than he means to. He follows up immediately, draping himself over Hajime, leaning in so close their noses graze together.

He opens his mouth, but Hajime gasps a sharp _“Yes”_ before he can get out the question.

Oikawa kisses him. It’s not anything particularly special or different from how he normally kisses him, but Hajime is already so worked up, and the pressure of Oikawa’s chest against his, the fact that it’s _Oikawa_ and Hajime is so in love--it’s a lot. He grips at Oikawa’s sides and kisses back as calmly as he can manage. There’s nothing he can do to stop Oikawa from feeling how pathetically into this he is, but he at least can contain his frantic, desperate energy to inside his body, where it belongs.

Oikawa smooths the hand not propped up next to Hajime’s head along his thigh. He pushes his knee out to the side so he can do it again, against the sensitive, softer skin inside. A moan, tiny and involuntary, passes from Hajime’s mouth to Oikawa’s.

Before Hajime has time to pray Oikawa hadn’t heard it, Oikawa is moving, shifting further over of him, knocking his legs apart with his knees to resettle fully on top of him, between them. He twists their tongues together, bites Hajime’s lip. He ghosts his palms up Hajime’s thighs.

In a moment of temporary insanity--because there’s really no other explanation for it--Hajime tightens his hold on Oikawa, dragging him closer in a bid for more--of this, of Oikawa, big and overwhelming and everything Hajime wants, heavy and hot, pressing him into the mattress. He tugs Oikawa closer and it forces him down, so that his hips rest against where Hajime is hard in his boxers.

The electric zing up his spine is smothered instantly by the horror of Oikawa going head-to-toe rigid above him.

“Oh,” Oikawa says flatly. He buries his face in Hajime’s neck and shivers. “Oh, _Hajime_ , you’re hard.”

Hajime could throw up. He shoves at Oikawa and grits out, “Shut up, Shittykawa.”

“No,” Oikawa responds, childishly, resting more weight on him. “No, I want--”

He rolls his hips against Hajime’s. Hajime feels it then--the stiffness of Oikawa’s cock beneath the three layers of cloth between them.

That’s fine. It’s fine. It’s totally fine. It’s not really even surprising. He’s undoubtedly drowning in the lust Hajime’s putting out and, at this point, boners are probably a Pavlovian response to having somebody that turned on for him. It’s not _for_ Hajime.

But. It doesn’t change the fact that Oikawa is hard and grinding down against him.

He turns his face into the pillow under his head and presses his lips together, but there’s no helping the noises anymore. They’re soft and hurt sounding in the back of his throat, making warmth licks over his cheeks, his ears, down his neck.

Oikawa kisses the exposed side of his jaw, messy and wet. “Is this okay? I want to-- Iwa-chan, can I make you come?”

Hajime freezes and Oikawa stiffens in response. He very carefully pulls away and sits back on his heels between Hajime’s legs.

There’s a look of real embarrassment on his face, cheeks pink, mouth twisted, but under it he just looks tired. Disappointed.

It occurs to Hajime then, for the first time since he learned about all this incubus shit, what a misery it must be. Even for someone as beautiful and likeable as Oikawa, it can’t be easy having to rely on other people wanting to have sex with him just to feel okay. It sounds exhausting.

Still, he should say no. Hajime should tell him to go find one of his groupies if he’s that hungry, to shut up and go to sleep. He should say no, if not for any other reason, then for the sake of his pride. It’s too much to ask his self-respect to stay firm while he lets Oikawa intentionally manipulate his feelings for his own benefit to this extreme.

But it’s Oikawa. No matter how cruel and humiliating this request may be, it’s Hajime’s best friend asking. Feelings for Oikawa and his own ego aside, there’s a lifetime of friendship between them, over fifteen years of precedent that says that Hajime will give Oikawa anything he asks for.

Really it’s no question at all.

Hajime takes a gulping breath and nods.

Oikawa’s eyes cut to him, dark and pretty and stunned. He rests faltering hands on Hajime’s waist. Then, after a moment of hesitation, he dips them under the soft cotton of Hajime’s t-shirt, skims them up Hajime’s sides until his shirt is bunched up under his armpits.

He’s staring down at him with such intense scrutiny that it makes Hajime flush with sudden mortifying awareness of how he must look right now, how lewd, how wanting, with his legs spread, slung over Oikawa’s thighs, his chest exposed, cock bulging in his underwear.

“Really? Are you sure? No,” Oikawa says to bob of Hajime’s head. “No, tell me.” He’s whining now. He leans forward to kiss Hajime, withdraws almost immediately, whines again. “I need you to say it out loud. Tell me I can. You want it. It’s okay if I touch you. You want me to.”

Hajime means to tell him to _stop talking_ , but only a strained, “Yeah, yes” comes out when he opens his mouth. Oikawa groans.

He dips in again, kisses him softer than Hajime anticipated, kisses him tenderly. It’s the gentlest he’s been since that first time, years ago, and Hajime is hopelessly, piteously turned on by the sweetness. His hips hitch.

“You’re so--” Oikawa breaks off with a frustrated rumble.

He drops his pelvis back down to weigh on Hajime and rocks lightly against him.

It’s not enough, but it’s right where Hajime needs it. He moans and doesn’t fight the instinctual clench of his hamstrings or the way his knees fall further apart.

Oikawa starts thrusting against him in earnest, slow but rough and rhythmic. Hajime’s head rolls back and Oikawa uses the opportunity to suck harshly under his jaw.

It’s a lot at once. Hajime feels crazy with it, overwhelmed, ready to burst.

His hips twitch up with every roll of Oikawa’s, unable to control himself, until Oikawa grabs them and holds them still.

“I got you, I got you. Just let me.” He grinds down harder, faster.

“Oikawa,” Hajime pants. “Tooru.”

Oikawa quavers all the way down to his voice. “I can’t believe you. I can’t believe you’re like this.”

Like what Hajime doesn’t know. He’s too far gone to ask, too close to care that it’s likely something embarrassing. He shoves his hands up the back of Oikawa’s t-shirt to palm over the broad, hot muscle, and tries to hold on.

It’s useless. The friction is too good and Oikawa is too everything. Too tall and smooth and sweet and hard-working, burning like a forming star under his fingers. He doesn’t stand a chance. He never has.

Oikawa kisses next to his open mouth and says, “Come on. I want you to come. I want it. Iwa-chan, please.” and that’s it. Tidal wave pleasure and relief flood through him. He closes his eyes and gasps out small, stuttered moans, while Oikawa mutters nonsensically and works him through it.

When the coil of orgasm relaxes it’s chokehold on his nervous system, Hajime opens his eyes to Oikawa’s face hovering over his. He’s pink-cheeked and smiling. His eyes glitter as he laughs. “Iwa-chan is so pretty when he comes!”

Every square centimeter of Hajime goes cold.

He sits up robotically, without regard for the body on top of his. It forces Oikawa to pull back to keep their heads from knocking and he looks at him, surprised.

“Iwa-chan?”

Hajime is trembling. The wet in his boxers is cold and uncomfortable on his skin, but it is nothing, _nothing_ , next to the bone-deep humiliation, like none he’s ever felt before, ripping into and poisoning every cell in his body.

He hadn’t expected it wouldn’t be weird. There’s no way to get your best friend off and then go back to total normalcy. He hadn’t expected them to be the same old Oikawa and Iwa-chan right away. It was impossible. But--

But he hadn’t expected to be laughed at, either.

He’s so sickeningly embarrassed, he’s past blushing. Pale and clammy and heartbroken, he climbs off the bed, slapping Oikawa’s hands away when they reach forward to stop him.

“Iwa-chan, what’s wrong?” He watches Hajime pull on dirty sweatpants over his dirty boxers from the bed. When Hajime starts cramming textbooks into his backpack, his voice becomes alarmed. “Where are you going? It’s one in the morning. This is your room. Hajime, you’re scaring me.”

Hajime puts his coat on, his backpack on. “I need to get away--from here.” He can’t even look at him. “I need a couple days.”

Oikawa begins to stand up, to answer, but Hajime is already grabbing his keys and slipping out the door fast enough to escape whatever Oikawa says next.

\--

He hardcore avoids Oikawa for the next week or so.

By the grace of God, one of his friends from the girl’s volleyball team lives on the floor above him. She’s laid back enough to let him crash on her floor for a few days, only requiring his Netflix password and a detailed description of the drama keeping him from his own bed (which he lies his way through) as payment.

He kills all of the time he’d normally spend in his room or fucking around with Oikawa on friends’ couches, at the gym, or in a study carrel. He studies so much he worries he might be getting stupider and takes extra long chewing his food in the dining hall just for something to do. Unbelievably (or perhaps not unbelievably; it is _Oikawa_ , after all), even from a different university Oikawa had somehow managed to get a stranglehold on all of Hajime’s free time and it’s not until he finds himself sitting on a bench in the Quad after study group one night for no other reason than because he doesn’t know what else to do with his time that he realizes the extent of it, how deep it really goes.

It’s childish, maybe, ducking Oikawa this way, purposefully only returning to his dorm when he knows Oikawa’s at volleyball and not waiting behind the door to demand answers or force Hajime to confront how fucked up inside Oikawa’s got him.

Maybe it’s childish, but everything about Oikawa is tainted with heartache and humiliation right now. The thought of him makes Hajime’s soul shrivel, cringe away from the hurt, dramatic, but fucking true. He’s afraid of what he’ll say if he has to look at him, talk to him right now, what he’ll do to their friendship to protect himself from the pain.

So he lets himself be childish. Just for a little.

Oikawa is impatient, though. Impatient and persistent (Hajime has nearly sixty unopened texts from him that can attest to that). So when Hajime steps out of the Student Union to spot him shifting restlessly at the bus stop that will take him to the freshman dorm, he’s not surprised. The expectedness of it does nothing to dampen the spasm of anxiety that bites through him, though.

He beelines for the closest bus, hopping on without checking which line it is.

It’s only mid-afternoon so it’s not yet sardine-packed with off-campus and lazy students alike. He takes a seat at the front, where the seats face each other, across from a fire engine redhead and a dark-haired girl, laughing at something on one of their phones.

Thirty seconds later Oikawa drops down into the seat next to him. Hajime jumps. He looks pissed.

“What are you doing?”

Oikawa’s nostrils flare. “Are you kidding me, Hajime? What am _I_ doing? This is the bus to North Campus. I know you’re not--” He cuts himself off when the bite in his tone makes the girls opposite them look over. He takes a deep breath, composes himself. “I haven’t seen you in over a week. You haven’t answered any of my calls. You missed my game.” He’s accusing now. “We won.”

“I know,” Hajime says dumbly. He’d checked the score, at least.

Any remaining trace of anger fades out of Oikawa’s expression, melts into sadness and confusion that emphasize the darkness under his eyes and the dryness of his lips. “Iwa-chan, what happened? What did I do? I know I-- I asked for a lot,” he looks down at his fingers clenching together in his lap, mouth downturned, “but I could feel how into it you were and you said yes and I thought-- Well, I thought it was okay.”

Nothing about Oikawa is small, but he sounds it right now, small and young and naive. It makes Hajime shrink with guilt.

“I’m not--” He doesn’t know how to finish that sentence. Mad? Horrified? Fucking devastated? “This isn’t because you asked to...do that. It’s embarrassing, whatever, but I said you could. I told you to tell me if you were hungry.”

As if this ordeal wasn’t already horrible enough, he’s out of breath, turning his voice weak and shaky. He wonders if it’s his body picking up on the blaring _ESCAPE! ESCAPE! GET THE FUCK OUT OF THERE!_ in his head and attempting to suffocate him. At this point, it might be preferable.

“Then, what?”

Hajime leans his elbows against his knees and scrubs his hands over his face. Takes a deep breath. “You didn’t have to make fun of me.”

“What? Make fun of you?”

“You laughed at me.” He’s shaking. “You said I was pretty and you laughed at me.”

Oikawa looks taken aback. “I was just teasing you, Iwa-chan. I was happy and you _were_ pretty--”

“No,” Hajime cuts him off. That’s too much, too far. “Shut up. Stop. You don’t have to say that shit, okay? You’ve already got me. Hook, line, and sinker. So save the bullshit. It’s just embarrassing for both of us.”

“I’ve got you? What do you mean? I don’t understand.”

“Please don’t insult me by pretending you don’t know.”

Oikawa grabs his forearms and tugs them until Hajime has to sit up and angle toward him to keep from overbalancing. When he glances up automatically, Oikawa’s forehead is crinkled in a way it never is because he’s vain enough to decide what expression to wear based around avoiding wrinkles.

“Hajime, what are you _talking_ about?”

Hajime stares, waiting for him to say something else, anything else besides that question, calls his bluff. He doesn’t. He meets Hajime’s gaze, earnest and expectant and a little on the wrong side of flustered.

Hajime can’t believe Oikawa is making him say it. This is beyond anything.

“I’m in love with you,” he says finally. “Of course. Obviously.”

Glacier slow, Oikawa shakes his head, smiling, gross and fake. “No, you’re not.”

Well, that’s fucking awful.

“Okay.”

“You’re not.”

He pries Oikawa’s too tight grip on his arm open with numb, trembling fingers. He’s starting to get mad. He need Oikawa off of him right now. “You don’t have a problem with me liking guys, do you? That’s fucked, Oikawa.”

“Wait, you--” Oikawa jolts, releases him. “You’re into men?”

Hajime frowns. What does he mean _“You’re into men?”_? Obviously, he’s into men. Obviously?

“And women. I’m bi, I guess.”

Oikawa is gaping. “Oh my God. You’re in love with me.” He sucks in a breath. “ _You’re in love with me?_ ”

One time, when Hajime was a kid, he’d been hanging upside down by the bend of his knees from the metal monkey bars behind his school. For whatever dumb kid reason one of his friends decided it would be a good idea to wrap his arms around Hajime’s torso and hang on. They’d swayed together, airborne for the brief moment before Hajime’s legs slipped off the bar and they both smashed into the wood chips. That kid crushed every molecule of air out of Hajime’s lungs and he’d laid gasping and crying in the dirt for several minutes until his body realized it wasn’t dying and cooperated again.

That’s what this feels like, but a thousand over, a thousand times worse.

It seems _impossible_ , but there’s no denying the shock opening up his features: Oikawa hadn’t known. All these years he hasn’t been quietly ignoring Hajime’s feelings, treating him the same as he always did, preserving their bond despite Hajime loving him more than he should. He just. _Hadn’t. Known._

This might break their friendship. It never occurred to Hajime to worry about that before because he’d presumed Oikawa had always sensed it, felt it, _tasted_ it. Now, the full might of that fear bears down on him, a black hole in his heart.

“Oikawa, you knew. Tell me you knew.”

Oikawa doesn’t oblige him; he bursts into tears.

“I can’t believe I look this ugly for this,” he whines, tears streaming, eyes squinted. He cries unrestrained for a few long seconds, then visibly gathers himself, wiping his face with his knuckles. His eyes are wide and intense and Hajime’s favorite shade of brown when he turns them on him. “I love you too. Of course. Obviously.” He takes Hajime’s face in his hands and squishes his cheeks. “Stupid Iwa-chan. I’ve been in love with you for so long. _So_ long--almost a decade.” He laughs wetly, like he’s Hajime and he can’t believe it. “Makki and Mattsun bully me for it constantly.”

That’s what does it. That’s what makes it sink in: the idea that somehow Oikawa is in love with him and is obvious enough about it to evoke teasing from their friends.

Warmth, true and beautiful, spills through his chest. It’s a waterfall, it’s Niagara Falls, gushing and endless. It conforms around his organs, around his lungs and heart, makes them heavy and happy and alive.

“You…?”

Oikawa seems to understand what he wants. He nods with dorky enthusiasm. ”Yeah. I love you.” He smiles and it’s radiant, it’s 1,000-watt and real.

He pulls Hajime’s face closer. “Can I kiss you?”

The question make Hajime laugh. He’s dizzy with elation. He doesn’t give a fuck that they’re in public. He tips forward and gives Oikawa what he’s asking for, short and syrupy sweet.

When he pulls away, Oikawa ducks his head to the crook of his neck, laughs a hot, shakey puff of laughter and rubs his still wet eyelashes over Hajime’s throat. He sits back.

He looks good. He’s still tired. The dark circles remain, the way the do when they’re caused by human compulsions, rather than magical ones, but his hair shines where five minutes ago it was dull. His skin is glowing. He looks hale and healthy, and Hajime thinks greedily, _I want this forever_. He’s feeding him and for the first time he’s not bitterly ashamed; he’s proud.

Hajime socks him on the arm. “Are you stupid or what? How could you not know? You literally feed on how much I like you. It’s a wonder you even meet your scholarship requirements.”

Oikawa makes an offended, sputtering noise. “Iwa-chan! If these people report you and you get arrested for abusing your boyfriend I’m going to laugh!”

 _Boyfriend_. Hajime rolls his eyes, to cover how pleased the blush on his cheeks is.

He glances over at the aforementioned “people” and does a double-take. The girls across from them are both staring, a little open mouthed. Hajime gets the distinct impression that they’ve been observing virtually since Oikawa sat down. He goes redder than the redhead’s hair.

“Oh my God, I’m so sorry!” the brunette quickly exclaims, noticing his attention.. “We didn’t mean to eavesdrop, but it was kind of impossible not to? It’s just, that was just the cutest thing I’ve ever seen! I mean, wow!”

“Aimi, _shut up_ ,” her friend says. She looks horrified. Hajime can relate.

“No, that’s okay!” Oikawa waves a dismissive hand. His grin is sharks-tooth sharp and delighted. “We are very cute, aren’t we?”

The redhead jumps out of her seat like a frightened cat. “Nice to meet you,” she strangles out, yanking on Aimi’s jacket until she’s standing too. She gestures toward the window clumsily. They’re at a stop on State Street. Huh, Hajime hadn’t even realized they’d moved from central campus. “Come on, let’s go to that ramen place over there. I’m hungry.”

“But we were on our way--”

“I want to go to that place.” She smiles tightly at Hajime and Oikawa as she drags her friend past them to the front of the bus.

“Congrats on your love!” Aimi tosses back at them over her shoulder, cheerful even as she’s manhandled.

They step off and as the bus peels away, Hajime hears the redhead, high-pitched and loud, even over the mechanical hiss of pistons, “I have anxiety, idiot! You can’t just start weird conversations with handsome strangers professing their love to each other on the bus! I’ll freak out!”

Hajime laughs with his whole body. He doesn’t know what else to do. He’s on a bus going in the wrong direction, Oikawa loves him back, and they just scared a girl into physically fleeing from them. God, today has been weird.

Oikawa bumps their shoulders together, tilts head and smiles against Hajime’s throat.

“Let's go back to your dorm,” he says. “I’m hungry too.”

And good. Today has also been good.

**Author's Note:**

> um, bitch tf?? I did it. this is literally the first piece of non-school related writing I've ever finished or got past like the second page of. leave it to iwaoi lmao. 
> 
> all the stuff about Tokyo and Waseda University is straight up made up, fyi, and I'm so bad at proofreading so if you see mistakes pls roast me in the comments so I can fix it, thank u <3
> 
> come bother me [here](https://rebdoy.tumblr.com). I'm lonely and need friends
> 
> xoxo thanks for reading!!


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